‘Tis the season to be jolly, and what better way to keep the kids — and kids at heart — happy than with a brand new video game.

PlayStation 4 and Xbox One dominated the scene in 2014, along with a Windows PC for those who prefer a “lean-in” rather than “lean-back” interactive entertainment experience. If it’s console and computer gamers you’re shopping for, the following are some thumb-numbing suggestions. (Be sure to check the ESRB age-rating in the corner of the box before buying.)

KIDS

Sony’s LittleBigPlanet 3

Activision’s Skylanders Trap Team ($84.99 for Starter Kit; for all major consoles) is the latest in the popular four-year-old series that fuses video games with action figures. Connect the Traptanium Portal to your game console via USB and place the Skylanders on top, and they’ll instantly come alive inside the video game. As the name suggests, Trap Team also lets you trap defeated enemies in coloured crystals and use them as playable characters in future missions. Good news for parents: all previous Skylanders can be used in this new game, too.

If you’re buying for a Disney or Marvel fan, Disney Infinity: Marvel Super Heroes (2.0 Edition) Starter Pack ($74.99; for multiple platforms) offers a similar concept — place familiar characters on a USB-connected console accessory and they’re zapped onto your television screen. The gameplay is different than Skylanders, however, including a Toy Box mode that lets kids build their own worlds and play in them.

Young PlayStation 4 gamers, on the other hand, will likely fall for the charm of Sony’s LittleBigPlanet 3 ($59.99). Up to four friends can adventure together in this platforming puzzler that blurs the lines between game player and game designer — tools are included to create and share custom-made content. This third game in the series features a new story, three new playable characters (in addition to the lovable Sackboy) and 1080p HD resolution.

Another great pick for kids is Super Smash Bros. Wii U ($64.99), which features nearly 60 favourite video-game characters — including Mario, Pikachu, Samus and Link from The Legend of Zelda series — and lets up to four players battle each other locally or online across interactive environments inspired by classic Nintendo games. This Wii U game also supports the new amiibo action figures ($13.99 apiece) that come alive in the game after you touch them to the Wii U GamePad controller.

TEENS

2K Sports’ NBA 2K1

Sports fans can play ball with 2K Sports’ NBA 2K15 ($59.99; PlayStation 3/4, Xbox 360/One), a near photorealistic basketball simulation with more than 5,000 player animations, smart artificial intelligence and multiple game modes (including a new story-driven career campaign and a massively multiplayer online playground mode). Featuring NBA M.V.P. Kevin Durant on the cover and a head-bobbing soundtrack curated by Pharrell Williams, NBA 2K5 includes broadcast-style presentation, hosted by Shaq and Ernie Johnson.

As with its popular predecessors, Ubisoft’s Just Dance 2015 ($39.99 to $49.99; for multiple consoles) challenges gamers to mimic the moves of the onscreen dancers. Depending on the console you own — Nintendo Wii and Wii U, Sony PlayStation 3 or 4, and Xbox 360 or Xbox One — a camera or sensor just above or below the television, monitors your performance in front of the TV and awards you a score based on how well you match the pros. Even more fun than dancing solo, players can have friends or family members join them to play with or against each other (or others online, too, if desired). Just Dance 2015 not only features more than 40 pop tracks on the disc, but gamers can download the hit track Break Free by Ariana Grande featuring Zedd for free.

Who said all good first-person shooters were rated Mature? Activision’s Destiny ($59.99; for PlayStation 3/4 and Xbox 360/One) is a teen-rated online sci-fi shooter played with or without friends on numerous planets and moons in our solar system. Along with an epic story that’s slowly unravelled over time, the game features lots of customization, multiple-mission types and a wide arsenal of weapons, ships and gear. Destiny was created by Bungie Studios, the creators of the iconic Halo franchise.

ADULTS

Assassin’s Creed: Unity

What do you do after selling more than 75 million Assassin’s Creed games since 2007? If you’re Ubisoft, you launch a brand new adventure in the coveted franchise. Dubbed Assassin’s Creed: Unity ($59.99 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Windows PC), the game places you in the middle of Paris during the 1789 French Revolution and features the most immersive city environment in the game series to date. The stealthy sequel introduces cooperative (“co-op”) play for the first time in an Assassin’s Creed game, allowing for up to four friends to take part in story-driven online missions. Also from Ubisoft Montreal worth buying is Far Cry 4, a massive first-person shooter.

Activision’s Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare ($59.99; for multiple consoles and Windows PC) is the next chapter in the publisher’s best-selling military series. This time around, the game takes place in 2054 and with much more advanced weaponry — including a devastating energy weapon — as well as hover bikes and flying drones. Actor Kevin Spacey plays Jonathan Irons, the founder of a private military company who launches an attack on America.

Insomniac Games’ Sunset Overdrive ($59.99; for Xbox One) is an over-the-top third-person shooter that takes place in the near future, where the world is controlled by the FizzCo Corporation. You play as a janitor who must clean up the mess following the launch of an energy drink that has transformed people into mutants. Along with running and gunning, this colourful open-world action game includes agility-based combat including ziplines, mid-air acrobatics and parkour moves. Up to eight people can play co-operatively online, as well.

Another Xbox One exclusive, Halo: The Master Chief Collection ($59.99) is a bundle featuring previous games including Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3 and Halo 4. The collection also includes more than 100 multiplayer levels, a playlist maker, downloadable content and other goodies — and it’s all mastered in 1080p HD resolution and running at a smooth 60 frames per second. As a bonus, the Halo: Nightfall live action digital series is included, as is an invitation code for the Halo 5: Guardians multiplayer beta.

]]>http://o.canada.com/technology/gaming/the-hottest-offerings-in-interactive-play-for-the-whole-family/feed1Activision's Skylanders Trap Teampostmedianews1Sony's LittleBigPlanet 32K Sports' NBA 2K1Assassin's Creed: UnityWatch_Dogs: 5 videos of organic gameplay in actionhttp://o.canada.com/technology/gaming/watch_dogs-5-videos-of-organic-gameplay-in-action
http://o.canada.com/technology/gaming/watch_dogs-5-videos-of-organic-gameplay-in-action#respondWed, 28 May 2014 18:04:12 +0000http://o.canada.com/?p=453740Despite the criticism Watch_Dogs has received since its launch yesterday, I’ve had a great time with Ubisoft Montreal’s latest title. It isn’t the “next-generation” defining experience many people hoped for, but it’s still a great game. Manage your expectations and you’ll encounter a compelling open world title full of unique mechanics.

Many of the game’s more interesting moments happen organically and aren’t necessarily scripted parts of the game. Car chases, hacking people’s phones and preventing random crimes are what makes Watch_Dogs feel more than just a Grand Theft Auto V clone with slightly better looking visuals.

Over the last few days I’ve captured a collection of some of the more organic moments I’ve experienced in the game so far.

Intercepting a criminal convoy mission goes horribly wrong

In this video I wander around hacking information from people’s phones in an attempt to find one of Watch_Dogs many randomly generated missions. After running past a man who has been, “recently prescribed diarrhea medication,” and stealing a “performance artist’s” vehicle, resulting in a brief police chase, I finally get to the task at hand and try to intercept a criminal convoy.

Unfortunately things don’t go exactly as planned. Standing in the middle of the road with an assault rifle probably wasn’t a great strategy.

Hacking pedestrians’ smartphones and online contracts

One of the most interesting things to do in Watch_Dogs is wander around the city and hack random citizen’s phones. Pedestrians’ professions, salary and usually an amusing interesting fact about their personal life are instantly available as you walk past them.

I encounter a man who has a family member who recently committed suicide and make the morally questionable decision to hack his bank account. I then encounter a man who is suspected to associate with one of the city’s many gangs and decide to rob a former child prodigy.

Then in a perfect example of Watch_Dogs’ organic nature, an online player invades my game and starts hacking me. I’m tasked with finding the player, with the PlayStation Network ID “klabio, in my game world within a specified time limit. After an exhaustive search, I’m unable to locate where the player is hiding.

Coffee shop shootout

While going on murderous rampages doesn’t exactly fit into Watch_Dogs plot, world or make sense in terms of Aiden Pearce’s motivation and character, shooting everyone and everything in sight is still possible and an entertaining distraction.

In fact, Watch_Dogs shooting mechanics and controls are much better than GTA V’s. In this video I try to stay alive for as long as possible while the game’s aggressive police hunt me down relentlessly.

I probably really shouldn’t have tried to escape by swimming though…

Taking out a gang hideout

In this video I take advantage of Watch_Dogs hacking features, thinning the gang’s ranks before pulling out my sniper rifle and picking my remaining foes off one by one.

In Watch_Dogs, side missions like this can be approached in a variety of ways. After a failed attempt and running in and shooting everything and everyone in sight, I instead opted for a between hacking and using my trusty sniper rifle.

For most of the mission the gang has no idea where my sniper bullets are coming from.

Destroying a truck with a small, compact car

While there’s already a similar mission in this list, this particular car chase went on for quite some time and is a great example of how destructible certain elements of Watch_Dogs’ world is.

My small vehicle had great difficulty disabling the hulking pickup truck I was chasing and we bounded through the city streets, over jumps and through the fence’s of people’s backyards.

All footage was captured with an Elgato HD Capture Card with Watch_Dogs running on the PlayStation 4.

]]>http://o.canada.com/technology/gaming/watch_dogs-5-videos-of-organic-gameplay-in-action/feed0Watch_DogspatrickorourkeWii U exclusive Rayman Legends delayed for multiplatform releasehttp://o.canada.com/technology/gaming/wii-u-exclusive-rayman-legends-delayed-for-multiplatform-release
http://o.canada.com/technology/gaming/wii-u-exclusive-rayman-legends-delayed-for-multiplatform-release#commentsWed, 13 Feb 2013 19:06:06 +0000http://o.canada.com/?p=198915Ubisoft’s upcoming Wii U title, Rayman legends, release was recently delayed from Feb. 28 to Sept. 9, so the game could go multiplatform and come out on the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 3 and the Wii U, all at the same time.

The issue many gamers have with this delay is the fact that the Wii U version of Rayman Legends is basically finished and technically could still be released on the Feb. 28. Also, with the next few months looking pretty slim release wise for Wii U owners, Rayman Legends was one of the few big name releases Nintendo faithful had to look forward to.

This has prompted fans of the game to create a campaign focused on convincing Ubisoft to release the the Wii U version of Rayman Legends on its original release date. The Reddit post regarding this effort has been upvoted 363 times and has 171 comments so far.

Even the game’s development team has posted pictures of them holding posters that call for Ubisoft to release the eagerly anticipated Wii U version of Rayman Legends on time. Rayman Legend’s developers posted on NeoGaf that the decision to delay the game came from people “high up” in the company and not the game’s actual development team.

“I completely understand you but you have to understand one thing. This is not a decision taken by the development team, this comes from really really high up, so please don’t pick on the game,” a member of the development team apparently posted this message on NeoGaf.

This decision was probably due to Nintendo lowering their forecast for the Wii U’s first quarter sales. Nintendo has sold 3.06 million Wii U’s since the system’s launch. It’s expected to sell four million units by March, which is 30 per cent less than its initial projection of 5.5 million. From a business perspective, bringing Rayman Legends to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, two systems that already have massive installed bases, makes complete sense.

As a gamer and Wii U owner who was really looking forward to Rayman Legends, this situation definitely isn’t ideal.

I went hands-on with Rayman Legends a few months ago and was very impressed with its unique use of Wii U’s GamePad. It also adopts a very different art style that looks almost hand drawn. It will be interesting to see how Ubisoft translates the game’s Wii U GamePad features to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Because of their nature, they aren’t very forgiving and I’ve always felt that they’re only fun until you get caught. Once your enemies discover you, their gameplay mechanics tend to fall apart and the game devolves into annoying repetition.

During a short preview of the upcoming Splinter Cell: Blacklist at Ubisoft’s Toronto office’s, one aspect of the game became very apparent: Splinter Cell: Blacklist is designed with gamers who might not necessarily enjoy stealth games in mind.

The game’s plot line follows Sam Fisher as the leader of a newly formed secret group called Fourth Echelon. Fisher and his team are tasked with taking out a rogue terrorist group who have a “Blacklist,” a countdown of terrorist attacks aimed at the United States and its various international interests.

During my brief play through, I tackled a mission that is set at the beginning of the game and one that occurs about halfway through it.

Blacklist’s environments are lush and very detailed.

The game’s cut scenes are excellent and feature similar capturing techniques to what was used with Halo 4. Blacklist renders a one to one model of its actors and cut scenes were performed with the actors all working together in a single motion capture studio. Pacing-wise, they have a very Call of Duty/CSI feel to them if that makes any sense. Dialogue is full of questions, banter and quick snappy answers but it’s also very entertaining.

Graphically, the PC build of Splinter Cell: Blacklist that I played looks very impressive and is exactly what you’d expect from a AAA video game studio like Ubisoft. I imagine the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions will end up looking slightly worse though.

The game places significant emphasis on player choice and allows Sam to chain various covert actions together. It also allows players to adopt three distinct play styles that the game’s developers refer to as ghost, panther or assault. Ghosts travel through the game totally undetected and assault players are more like myself. We run in, guns blazing and occasionally sneak around. Panthers are more of a mix of the two play styles.

Splinter Cell: Blacklist’s controls are surprisingly fluid and very easy to pick up.

Blacklist’s levels are also very open-ended and allow the player to approach them from different angles. On the easiest difficulty, various aides help the player navigate through the game. My personal favourite is the mark-and-execute mode that lets you take out multiple enemies quickly. Without helpers like this, I’d probably be completely lost in a game like Splinter Cell.

In typical Splinter Cell fashion, the game also features cool gadgets, like a remote control drone, that helps you take your enemies out. Interestingly, Blacklist doesn’t actually feature traditional menus in its current build. Instead, the entire game is accessed through a cargo airplane that you can walk around. Imagine the Normandy from the Mass Effect series controlling the entire game’s modes and you’re on the right track.

Using Blacklist’s in-game currency actually lets you upgrade this plane, giving you new in-game abilities like radar.

I loved the fact that Blacklist still allowed me to run and gun through levels. Stealth has never been my thing in video games.

For the purists out there, Splinter Cell: Blacklist offers a hardcore mode that removes all of the game’s stealth helpers. This mode is more akin to the old school Xbox-era Splinter Cell titles. Blacklist also features the ability to customize Fisher’s gear in various loudouts, sort of like how Call of Duty Works.

The game is set to include cooperative missions and the Spys Vs. Mercs competitive multiplayer mode that was present in past Splinter Cell titles. Splinter Cell: Blacklist is set to be released on August 20th, 2013.

Before my play through of Blacklist, I got a chance to sit down and have a conversation with Ubisoft Toronto’s creative director Maxime Béland.

Q: Would you describe Splinter Cell: Blacklist as a reboot of the Splinter Cell franchise?

Maxime Béland: That’s a funny question because we never though about whether it was a reboot or a continuation of Splinter Cell: Conviction. I think that we’ve changed or upgraded and expanded so many elements (you know how we changed the structure of the game with the hub system) that people are going wow, it feels like a brand new game.

In our heads, it’s a continuation of the brand. you’re still playing as Sam Fisher and the game happens six months after Conviction. At the beginning of the game we talk about this… I think we’ve definitely evolved a lot from conviction though…

To me, with conviction we changed the formula of Splinter Cell a little bit and made it more action oriented and I think that Blacklist is the end point of this vision.

Conviction was the first step and this is an expanded version of that concept.

Q: Would you then say that the game is a little more action oriented than past Splinter Cell titles?

Maxime Béland: For us, it’s all about the game’s play styles. It’s our game because we’re making it, but once we’re done and a customer pays $60, that game belongs to them now. That’s why we have the economy system and the customization options on Sam.

The play styles is the same idea. It you’re an action player and you want to focus more on action, you totally can… but you won’t make that much money. We’re hoping that eventually players will gravitate towards being more stealthy. Also, depending on difficulty modes… you’re definitely going to have more fun playing in the panther or ghost mode.

At the same time it’s your game, right? So if you want to play in assault mode we have cool gadgets to support that, like frag grenades.

Q: I’ve always been horrible at stealth video games (I hated Dishonored) and I think that’s why I’ve never really been interested in stealth video games, particularly the Splinter Cell series. But with Blacklist, it seems like you’ve implemented a bunch of features that make the game easier and more appealing to someone like me.

Well I think the first thing obviously is difficulty. We’re doing play tests right now and there is a one to one link between difficulty and fun in our play tests. A map that is too difficult is ranking less fun and a map that is perfectly difficult ranks super high fun.

I think the first thing about how you play is this: our first three difficulty modes basically only affect detection and the power and strength of our enemies. We also have a final mode for purists.

In Blacklist, the game’s open-ended levels give the player a variety of gameplay options.

I think if you’re more of an action player, the customization of Sam will really appeal to you. We have better armour, goggles that let you see enemies better… the last upgrade of goggles lets you see the footsteps of the AI. I think this is a really big help for people who aren’t that comfortable with stealth…

We have a lot of gaming helpers that will help you play stealthier if you want to. Upgrading the plane also gives you new in-game features like radar that help.

Q: So do you think I’ll still have fun with the game if I play it in an action oriented way?

For me, I think the game shines the most in panther mode. I might really be a bit similar to you where I’m not an ultra patient gamer. I don’t want to hide for two or five minutes learning the patrols of enemies.

I like to show up and see one or two dudes, mark them, then three two, I’m going in, you come out and you execute them and two or three hundred points.

My secret dream is that we get a lot of action players and then through the economy system and the mechanics, they get pushed towards panther and ghost… It’s a tactical game and you need to think before you act. But sometimes some players don’t want to think before they shoot (that’s why Call of Duty is selling so much right?).

Hopefully the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 build of Blacklist looks as great as the PC version I played during my demo.

At the same time, I think there is an amazing feeling when you are being tactical and you make up a plan in your head…

That’s when I think you get people to create their own stories in the game. When games are more linear and scripted, everyone gets the same experience when they play. Then you don’t get to tell a story after. The real stories that we have are from systemic games like Grand Theft Auto where it’s your own personal story and that’s what’s great about it…

Maxime Béland: I think the simplest explanation is that with the technology we’re using we’re at a point where it’s just like a movie. We’re shooting our cinematics the same way we would shoot a movie.

This requires us to have an actor like we were actually shooting a Splinter Cell: Blacklist movie. Michael Ironside doesn’t have the physicality to play Sam Fisher in a movie. So it’s the same thing for us. We’re capturing facial voice and movement all at the same time and this is the key.

We’re paying actors a lot of money because they can act and what does that mean? That means that they look at certain moments and they pause at certain moments and they deliver lines a certain way… there’s that moment in one of the demo scenes where no one is talking, but everyone is acting and that’s what performance capture allows us to do.

That’s what you can’t get by one actor doing the body and one actor doing the voice and animators doing the facial animation.

Its plot line might be a little silly, but its world and characters are compelling and, most importantly, extremely fun. But because of other big name first-person shooter releases like Call of Duty: Black Ops II and Halo 4, Far Cry 3, it could slip under most gamers’ radars.

This is a huge mistake because the game is an absolute blast.

Far Cry 3 combines the best elements of Halo, Uncharted and Grand Theft Auto, mixing open world gameplay with intense cinematics and an interesting story. It also improves on Far Cry 2’s mechanics in almost every way, especially when it comes to enemy intelligence.

In Far Cry 3, the player assumes the role of Jason Brody, while he is on vacation with a group of friends, in a made up tropical location called Rook Island. His alcohol fueled party vacation is interrupted by Vaas, an insane pirate, who captures Jason and his friends and plans to extort ransom money from their parents. Jason must then fight to save his friends and help the island’s indigenous people, the Rakyat, liberate Rook Island from their pirate oppressors.

Jason’s personal journey is the focal point over the course of the game and it’s very interesting. He moves from being a spoiled, self-entitled rich kid, who’s scared of weapons and violence, to an angry, somewhat insane, individual. The game’s tale of revenge and rescue is compelling and Jason’s progression as a character feels very natural.

By the end of the game, it’s easy to believe and understand why he now has the ability to destroy everything in his path. Interesting drug-induced hallucination segments are strewn through game and, for the most part, they’re all entertaining. A few of them don’t really seem to fit in with Far Cry 3’s flow and almost feel forced, though.

Surprisingly, Far Cry 3 works very well as a stealth action game.

At times, Far Cry 3’s plot also delves into dark territories and without giving too much away, a few of the game’s more violent segments might make some players a little uncomfortable.

Graphically, Far Cry 3 looks great. Character animations, especially when it comes to facial expressions, are top-notch. Occasionally though, because the game is set in a tropical island, parts of the game look almost too bright and colourful. A little variety in terms of environment design and colour pallet choice definitely would have been welcome because almost every corner of Far Cry 3’s giant open world looks identical.

It’s also very difficult to spot enemies in dense foliage and I found myself constantly using Brody’s camera to identify where my attackers were located. That must be one impressive sensor in his DSLR because the fact that a digital camera somehow detects enemies, really doesn’t make much sense.

Character design left me a little underwhelmed though, because Vaas’ army of pirates look almost identical and all wear red clothing. I understand that they’re pirates and that the choice of colour is so players can identify friend from foe, but it would have been great to see more variety in terms of their appearance. Shooting enemies who look all look the same, starts to get boring after a while.

Overall, Far Cry 3’s world is beautiful. Jump off a cliff on a hang glider and look around; it’s hard to deny just how amazing Rook Island looks. The game also has some of the most realistic water effects I’ve ever seen in a video game.

There are a lot of pirates on Rook Island.

Unlike Far Cry 2’s boring environment, Far Cry 3’s Rook Island isn’t an empty world filled with way points, it’s a living, breathing space, complete with wild animals to hunt and a dynamic day and night cycle. Simply just driving around the island and completing side missions (like supply drop), is a ton of fun. Ubisoft’s other big title this year, Assassin’s Creed III, featured a comprehensive hunting mode. While Far Cry 3’s isn’t exactly as in-depth, it’s definitely more necessary.

If you want to carry more than one weapon, extra money, or more items in your ruck sack, be prepared to hunt down specific animals to craft items that will allow you to do this. While this forces players to experience Far Cry 3’s hunting mode, it’s also annoying. I just want to carry three weapons, not travel halfway across the island hunting down deer to create some sort of satchel. Many gamers will definitely find this feature very appealing though, and it doesn’t really take that long to hunt down the animal you’re looking for.

Rook Island isn’t just gorgeous, it’s also fun to explore.

The game’s voice acting is also superb. For instance, Vaas’ voice is extremely compelling and his unhinged insanity really shines though in this particular performance. It’s not just Vaas though, almost all of the game’s characters offer up convincing, entertaining voice acting, which these days, is a rarity, even in big budget action video games.

The main feature that sets Far Cry 3 apart from other first-person shooters is the fact that it’s an open world game. Levels can be approached in a variety of different ways, either through a head-on guns blazing confrontation, or stealthily, taking out enemies covertly. At first glance, you wouldn’t think that Far Cry could possibly work as a stealth game, but it does. Players have the ability to kill enemies with various take-down techniques earned by levelling up Brody. Occasionally though, certain missions require the player to remain undetected and this can get very frustrating at times.

Various vehicles are also available to get from point A to point B in Far Cry 3 and thankfully, they’re much easier to find, making it harder to get stranded in the middle of nowhere. They’re also fun to drive this time around and each car, whether it be a jeep, a small hatchback or a dune buggy, all control very differently. Also, if you just want to complete the game’s missions as quickly as possible, it has a great fast travel system.

When animals randomly attack your enemies, it’s hard not to smile at how great Far Cry 3’s sandbox based gameplay is.

Also, Far Cry 3’s RPG-like elements fit perfectly into its gameplay. Players earn points for taking out enemies and these points can then be used to purchase various abilities like extra health, special take downs, and the ability to reload weapons while still looking through a scope. This feature gives gamers the ability to customize Far Cry 3’s main character by putting points into skills that fit their play style.

Some of the game’s missions are undeniably entertaining. One part of the game has you hang gliding into a valley full of marijuana plants. Then, the player must torch all of the pirate’s crops using a flame thrower while battling hordes of enemies. While this is all going on, surprisingly good reggae infused dubstep throbs in the background. It might not sound like much, but this level was the most fun I’ve had with a video game in a while. Also, in one instance, I was being chased through the jungle by an angry tiger. Instead of shooting the beast, I ran into the nearest group of enemies. The animal then proceeded to rip my foes to pieces and walk away. This is why Far Cry 3 is awesome.

Far Cry 3’s vehicles are actually fun to drive (unlike Far Cry 2’s).

Far Cry 3 also features a relatively underwhelming multiplayer mode. It doesn’t really feel like it belongs in the Far Cry universe and in many ways, makes me feel like it’s just Call Of Duty: Jungle Edition. It includes all the standard game modes you’d expect from most first person shooters but lacks the level of polish that is present in titles like Halo 4 or Call of Duty: Black Ops II. If you’re a die-hard Far Cry fan, you might find something to enjoy though, especially if you experiment with the game’s map editor. The game also features a separate cooperative campaign that I didn’t spend significant time with but it was pretty fun with a small group of friends.

Far Cry 3 might not have the deepest plot line and it does have a few flaws, but it’s the most fun I’ve had with a video game in quite a while. Rook Island is beautiful, full of life and almost never gets boring.

This is a review of the Xbox 360 version of Far Cry 3. The game is also available on PlayStation 3 and on the PC. It was released on December 4th 2012.